box Posts

Every CEO and management team of an up and coming company needs to figure out a way of punching above their weight in order to avoid being squashed by much larger competitors once these turn their attention on them. Slack, a team messaging and collaboration tool already successful with smaller businesses, is facing just such a challenge this year, as it launches its new enterprise offering. Does the company stand a chance of succeeding among enterprise customers in the face of growing competition from giants like Microsoft, and even Google and Facebook? If so, how?

Box’s long-planned and ultimately successful IPO provides me with a timely reminder to compare the cloud storage and file sharing company with its better-known, much larger and higher-valued competitor, Dropbox, whose IPO date has still not been set though it is expected this year. With Google, Microsoft and even Apple also in the cloud storage and file sharing business, you have to wonder about the long term outlook for these two pure-play companies. Assuming they can continue as independent businesses, which one of the two will “win” the battle over the long haul?

Since IBM announced its latest decline in revenues and profits and finally abandoned its much-publicized 2015 $20EPS goal, pundits have been understandably quick to pounce with their criticisms. Today IBM looks more broken even than HP was three years ago, when Meg Whitman became CEO and began her transformation of the company. What about IBM under Ginni Rometty’s stewardship? What should IBM’s role and strategy be going forward? And can this wobbly giant rejuvenate its business?